10 Must HAVE'S/ DO's During Pregnancy

10 Tips, Tricks, and Products I Believe Kept Me Fit and Looking Good During Pregnancy

Fit pregnancy, reduce stretch marks, nice skin.

Mio Skin Care

Halfway through my pregnancy I discovered Mio Skin Care that another fit prego mommy recommended. I bought the gift set with belly cream, nipple balm, yoga mat spray, and leg lotion. Out of all my favorite is the nipple balm. It helps ease pain with swelling, as well as firms and hydrates your skin.

Vitamin E oil mixed with Coconut Oil

I mixed these together in my hands and rubbed the oils all over my body. It really kept my skin feeling more hydrated and healthy. In fact I got to the point where I would add all kinds of oils that are good for the skin and mix them all together. I’m convinced that all this things I added on my skin religiously is what reduced / prevented stretch marks.

Raw Shea Butter by Hobo

The best shea butter EVER! I rubbed this all over my body and even on my face when I would get really dry, or break out with acne. Believe it or not the Shea butter fixed it all and my skin thanked me for it. I also love how it smells. I will say the downside to this is its pricey especially with shipping. www.genuinehobo.com

Homemade Coffee Scrub

Coffee scrubs are known to exfoliate the skin as well as hydrate. This scrub helps reduce the appearance of stretch marks and cellulite, and makes your skin feel as soft as your newborn baby will feel. Check out my recipe page for the ingredients! I promise you will thank me later.

Foam Rolling and Stretching

When pregnant I had on and off days. Some days you feel great and have energy, and even more days I felt lethargic, unmotivated, and very tired. When your pregnant it’s never a good idea to push yourself, and add any unnecessary stress to your body. So, if I was tired I relaxed, and if I had energy, I’d do something. But on days that I didn't want to workout but still wanted to do something for myself, I would stretch!

Stretching is great, and even more enjoyable when pregnant. I helped reduce any aches and pains I had and helped with a better night of sleep. I recommend 10-20 minutes of stretching 1-3 times a week. It helps you get your blood going, release any tension in your muscles, and foam rolling helps with myofascial release. Not to mention it makes you feel good about yourself if you at least did something active for your body!

Frequent Light Healthy Meals

I noticed having smaller and more frequent healthy meals as opposed to unhealthy or larger meals throughout the day made huge difference. Not only did it help fight being nauseated in my first trimester, it reduced pregnancy food craving for me, and kept my metabolism and energy up. I noticed eating like this I was able to gain the necessary weight for my BMI and not a pound more. I was worried of gaining excess weight while pregnant so I made a goal to only gain what was recommended for my BMI. Smaller frequent healthy meals and of course exercise helped me reach my goal.

Exercise

Keeping up on an exercise routine is important. It helps keep your body moving, your metabolism working, it reduce aches and pains, and helps prevent massive weight gain along with high risks. Below I have added a leg workout that is short and effective to get your blood flowing and mood elevated! This 8 minute workout can be done anytime of the day and even a busy mom can fit it in and feel good about it.

These workouts are designed to be quick and effective for days you aren’t really feeling it but you have 8 minutes to spare! Make sure you give it your all and try to complete as many reps of the exercise as you can in one minute!

8 Minute Legs

1 min of Squats

1 min of Lunges

1 min of Sumo Squats

1 min of SD to SD Lunges

-30 sec break-

REPEAT

Hanes Cotton Sport Bra

During pregnancy my boobs doubled in size, they ached and hurt, and wearing my normal bras was very uncomfortable . I went to Walmart and bought myself some Hanes Cotton Sports bras in a size larger than I normal wear. I wore them every single day. They were comfortable, not too tight, but gave me the support I needed. What was even better they were cheap!

Blanqi Leggings

The only leggings I could wear! Check out their Instagram page @blanqigirls. The legging I got are the pregnancy leggings that come up over your growing belly to give it the support it needs. They were awesome and I wore them almost every day. The only recommendation on these is they need to be washed inside out and DO NOT DRY THEM IN THE DRYER! Hang them up to air dry. If you dry them they start getting little balls of lint on them that don't come off. 

Starting the Morning with 16 oz of Warm Lemon Water

Sometimes drinking enough water can be hard for some during pregnancy. It sure was for me! I made a pact with myself to wake up and immediately warm up 16oz of water and squeeze a lemon in it. This started my morning ahead on drinking enough water, I could feel my metabolism kick start, and it gave me the energy I needed. It’s crazy because chugging water in the morning really does give you a mood boost, and that's your body thanking you. Being hydrated is very important, it helps everything in your body work better, and lets not forget to mention keeps your skin hydrated and glowing.